Who is Udo Kier?

WHAT’S HE UP TO? The sleekly handsome German currently stalks theaters in Blade, playing Dragonetti, the majordomo of an underground vampire society. In Armageddon‘s training sequence he’s the psychologist analyzing the roughnecks.

WHERE HAVE YOU SEEN HIM BEFORE? With 80-odd (and we do mean odd) TV and movie credits, he’s best known for his campy title roles in Andy Warhol’s Dracula and Frankenstein, though his most-seen Stateside flick is probably Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, in which he plays shady entrepreneur Ronald Camp. ”As an actor it gets boring to play always the villain,” laments Kier, 53, even though he feels ”the villain is the character that the people remember.” He’s also as comfortable in the art house (working with directors Lars von Trier and Wim Wenders) as he is in the multiplex, where he’s added sinister spice to Johnny Mnemonic and Barb Wire. And then there’s his photos in Madonna’s torrid Sex book….

WHAT’S NEXT? The comedy The Debtors, with Randy Quaid and Michael Caine (”I play three characters, each totally different, not one scary”), and he’ll likely reprise his role as Lorenzini in the sequel to The Adventures of Pinocchio. ”It is fun to play evil parts…especially vampires,” muses Kier. ”But we’ve surrounded ourselves, especially in Hollywood, by vampires. Every stockbroker and every agent…. They have no fangs. But they are vampires.”